


training grounds

by joeri



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Closeted Character, Drabble, M/M, Unrequited Crush
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-26
Updated: 2019-08-26
Packaged: 2020-09-26 21:38:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 841
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20396548
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/joeri/pseuds/joeri
Summary: They’re sat on the training grounds—scratch that.Sylvainis sat on the training grounds and Felix is oiling his blade as you’re meant to do, as they’rebothmeant to do and Sylvain is propped up on his elbows, knees splayed, ass down on the training grounds.And Felix is tired of dancing around the topic.





	training grounds

“Why not just be honest about it?” Felix grouses, ever one for the cut and dry path; he oils his blade as he speaks and takes his eyes toward Sylvain’s own, still in the scabbard.

“Honest about it? I’m always honest,” Sylvain says, markedly disingenuous; the wink says as much and Felix isn’t desperate enough to find it charming in the least.

They’re sat on the training grounds—scratch that. _Sylvain_ is sat on the training grounds and Felix is oiling his blade as you’re meant to do, as they’re _both_ meant to do and Sylvain is propped up on his elbows, knees splayed, ass down on the training grounds.

And Felix is tired of dancing around the topic.

“How long have we known each other?” coos Sylvain, knowing the siren song that’ll tug at Felix’s nostalgic heart-strings—knowing how to derail a conversation and how to save his skin.

It isn’t working today. Felix sighs, “enough to know when you’re overcompensating.”

“Eh?”

Felix applies dab after dab upon the flat of the blade until a runny, piss-colored reflection is glancing back at him. His voice comes clipped.

“You’re doing too much. You’re smiling with your voice, your words to cover up you can’t manage it enough with your face anymore. You’re faking it along.”

Sylvain doesn’t speak, only stretches his back out against the stairs leading up and hopes that his spine will let a bit of pressure come loose. It’s no surprise that he’s hiding his face now, Felix thinks. He doesn’t point that out further, though. He wipes the blade clean and the rust and dirt gives way to a shine.

Holding the blade up and letting it catch the light, turning it over and over again in his hand, Felix nods. This is any old conversation to him. He doesn’t expect Sylvain to listen. Maybe that makes it worse.

At least Sylvain’s laughter does. It breaks the silence and it also manages to make the two of them feel disconnected from each other in the same room, as though they somehow don’t know exactly what the other is thinking.

Maybe after all this time, they don’t.

“Say, Felix, you don’t seem very invested.”

“Did you want me to stop what I was doing to tell you something I’ve been telling you our entire lives?”

Sylvain’s inability to respond is deafening and Felix reaches for his sanding pad with a jerk in his step.

“You talk all the time about how much we’ve known each other. I don’t like repeating myself. See how much I do it anyways and what good it does me or anyone else.”

Voice small, almost meek if it weren’t for the volume, (oh and the laugh), Sylvain goes, “do you really hate me that much?” and Felix takes to sanding his blade from the hilt to the tip.

“I’m not answering that.”

Sylvain swallows hard.

Felix moves his hands so not to move his mouth, but he does anyway. “You know I don’t, so don’t ask.”

“Then, are you just having a bad day—?”

“You don’t even like women,” Felix says suddenly, like it’s a secret they’ve been keeping.

It’s far from breaking news. Sylvain turns on his side.

“Felix, that’s not true.”

His attempts at sanding the blade turn rougher, his movements more pronounced.

“You don’t really think I’m that bad of a guy, do you? I mean… I know I play the field a little. I just like to have fun.” His words turn from gently defensive to something of a jeer. “What’s wrong with wanting to look around before I’m locked into a relationship for the rest of my life? What’s wrong with looking for someone who doesn’t care about my Crest? What’s wrong with wanting the right to pick and choose?”

“You know that’s not what this is about,” Felix says a little quieter, turning the blade over.

Sylvain sits back up and he only realizes just now that the two of them haven’t looked one another in the eye this whole conversation. Felix is taking care of his blade and won’t look at him, and Sylvain hasn’t even tried to notice.

Sylvain finds his hands in fists and stands to flank Felix’s side, uncaring for the proximity to his blade as he shifts it about in the sunrays.

“What is this about then?”

“You’re interested in something else entirely, Sylvain,” he says, voice rushed and hushed and Sylvain catches the drift with ease.

“What else? M… Men?”

Felix retracts his blade, sheathing it quick before locking eyes with Sylvain long enough to realize that he _can’t_. His composure lasts just until his mouth opens up, until his eyes find solace in Sylvain’s open-ended answer, his cherry-brown eyes and wildfire hair.

For too long now Felix has burned, and he says in a voice that sounds like ‘enough,’ that sounds like breaking—he says, “is there something wrong with that?”

His eyebrows arch in and he drags himself from Sylvain’s reach, kicking over his scabbard on the way out.

**Author's Note:**

> slowly easing my way into writing again, havent written in a long time even though i have a lot of desire to. its The Depression. still trying to find my way around their dynamic.
> 
> these two have been in love since they were 5 and are acting like theyre not and its hysterical


End file.
